


Fade Away

by Adaris



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Arm an Archivist Campaign 2020, But I can promise that I will give Jon a sword, But that's my vibe, Eldritch Angel Jon, End!Georgie, F/F, It's Apocalypse Time!, Jon can talk to the Admiral, Lowkey Trans Martin, M/M, Shoutout to WTNV, This fic is just weird, Will add more tags as I publish the chapters, post watcher's crown
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:54:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22993528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adaris/pseuds/Adaris
Summary: The world is changed; Martin knows it when he looks at the sky and at the creature that used to be his boyfriend. All he wants to do is make some kind of a difference. Unfortunately, this may be the last kind of difference he makes.
Relationships: Georgie Barker/Melanie King, Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	1. Halo

**Author's Note:**

> I amar prestar aen.

Fifteen pieces. At first, he thinks they might be rocks, or gems, but they will prove to be pieces. Each one is, visually, absolutely awful. Martin doesn't look at any of them too hard. All of them are rotating around Jon like a ring of stars around a dizzy cartoon character's head.

Jon smiles at Martin, and his smile is terrible and sharp. "The sky is looking back," he says with a giggle that turns into a laugh that Martin will wish, years later, he could forget.

The pieces snap together as if by magnets, linking into a halo that hovers above Jon's head. The colors and textures smear together in the world's most disgusting rainbow, and then they turn into a glowing light that outlines Jon in shining silver.

Jon stands up and smiles at Martin again, his mouth too wide and full of teeth. Martin catches the impression of wings behind him, moth and bird and bat and insect, all of them covered in eyes, and strange shadows with no source flicker over the kitchen.

"Jon, stop it," Martin pleads. "Look, give me that thing—" He reaches out for the halo.

Eyes open all along the edge of the halo, each one the same shade of sparkling green, and fuck if that color isn’t familiar—it’s the color of Jonah Magnus’ eyes.

Jon twists away from Martin. "It can’t be undone. The world will always be ending, and beginning, and _ending,_ and I will drink it all in."

"No, you won’t!" Martin smacks him with a book.

All the halo’s eyes blink in surprise. 

"You’ll be with me, dammit! Drinking tea and—"

"—and eating biscuits and having a lovely chat around the fire while we roast chestnuts, that wouldn’t be the end of the world, would it, if we were all happy and suffocating in hugs all the time? Would it be the end of the world? Well for me, it would. How stupid of you to think I could ever be happy trapped in a life like that with you." Jon laughs again and sneers just as quickly. " **I think I’ll take your statement now, Martin.** "

"Fuck," Martin says. He grabs the nearest thing off the table (the statement Jon had been reading) and flings it at Jon in a sad attempt at a distraction before legging it back outside.

Jon ignores the fluttering papers, eyes shining reflective green, and follows. "It’s no use. I can see you. I can always see you."

But Martin feels pretty fucking lonely right now, and he can use that to his advantage. He just has to concentrate.

"Please, Martin, we both know you can’t run that far." Jon’s footsteps crunch along their gravel walkway.

Martin hides in the little stand of pines near their safehouse, trying not to breathe too loudly or step on anything or trip or—there's only one thing he actually _can_ do. Not that he wants to. But it's the only way he knows out of this.

The early Scottish morning is misty as always, a soft haze that rolls in from the sea. He pulls the mist in around him like a cloak (the way Peter taught him), and the ache of loneliness starts to work through his chest. The eyes in the sky are veiled behind the fog rolling in.

Very carefully, Martin creeps out of the misty pines and towards Jon, standing on the gravel path.

"Very clever, Martin, but how long can you keep this up before you vanish? I won’t be coming after you this time." 

Martin feels hot tears prickle at the corners of his eyes, and they rapidly cool as they roll down his face. "I’m sorry about this." He pushes the mist forward, puddling around Jon’s feet and swirling up his body until he’s completely wrapped in fog.

"Martin, stop this. You know I can still see you." A silver glow flares around Jon, slicing through the mist like a beacon.

"Fuck." Martin pushes harder, and the sun starts to dim in the sky as clouds roll in from nowhere. A fine mist starts to fleck his hair and bead on his jumper, not quite rain, not quite fog.

"M—Martin? I can’t—just come out, and we can talk about this. Don’t you want to talk?" Jon’s wings rustle in the mist, the sound stifled and muted. "Martin?"

There isn't much time. Martin reaches out to Jon and silently gasps in surprise. His hands are semitransparent, and his voice is vanishing too, and it'll be too late for both of them if he doesn't _wrap this the fuck up_.

"I can’t… where… what’s happening? Why am I here? Where are you? Martin?" Jon’s voice has lost its haunting tone. He sounds almost worried, cut off from the rest of the world.

Martin hopes it was enough to sever his connection and lets the mist go in a rush. It floods back through the hills like the tide going out. "Jon!" he tries to shout, but he doesn't make a sound.

"Martin? What happened? Why am I outside? Wh—oh, that was actually a little bit clever of you!" Jon turns towards Martin and the eyes along the halo open again, Jonah Magnus green, like mildew and moss and that old copy of _The Swiss Family Robinson_ in artifact storage where the family dies, one by one, and is never found. "I think I might even be impressed."

"Why won’t you let him go?" Martin shouts.

"Who are you talking to, Martin? There's no one here but us." Jon walks lazily towards Martin, a hunter approaching injured prey. " **Now, I think there's something you wanted to tell me.** "

The soft click and whirr of a tape recorder, fuck knows where it is, filters through the morning mist.

Martin keeps very still, until Jon is standing right in front of him. "There is something," he says softly. "I really love you." He isn't sure if Jon can hear him, but at least he'll Know, later.

Martin has to dig deep for emotions this time. His parents, transitioning, being Peter’s assistant, and right now, so close to Jon but not being able to reach him. He’s always been close to the Lonely, but for this, he has to go back to places he never wanted to revisit.

Ironically, this is exactly what Peter had wanted from him.

And the worst part? It’s not even that far under the surface. It’s always been there.

The mist pours from Martin in waves, and the sun starts to fade away behind the gathering clouds. Whatever Jon had done is making it much easier to get lost. The loneliness is so familiar, like slipping into bed after a long day.

Jon squirms uncomfortably in the mist, all of his wings fluttering, barely visible as shadows in the grey. "Martin, please stop, you’re hurting me—"

Tears start to pour down Martin’s face, and he manages a tiny, "I’m sorry." His words don’t make a sound.

Jon's halo, burning bright even in the artificial twilight, is the only point of light Martin can see, and then even that fades.

See, it's an easy calculation—he needs to cut Jon away from the Beholding, whoever's making him say horrible things, and there's only one way to do that. Martin can't move them into the Lonely anymore, but he can force the Beholding away.

He looks down, and his own body is fading into the mist. Like he was never even there to begin with, like someone's erasing him piece by piece. His hands are already gone, but he knows they're still stretched out towards Jon.

Is this enough? Is he enough?

—

Jon wakes up with sharp things poking into his skin. His eyes open to see grey rocks pressing up against the lenses of his glasses, and he jerks backward. The rocks stick to him as he moves; some of them fall, and he winces at the sting of cold air into the sensitive skin.

"Martin?"

What had he been doing? Reading some statement… although, curiously, he can't remember what it was about.

Why is he outside with his face in the gravel?

"Martin?" he calls again. He scrubs the smaller pebbles from his face, knowing they've left angry red indents where they've been.

He's outside their safehouse; the morning is mistier than he remembers it being. Jon goes to stand up, joints creaking, and nearly falls over. _There's something on his back._

He panics and scrapes his hands over his shoulderblades, trying to figure out what the fuck it is. His hands touch feathers, and smooth leathery skin, and the delicate gossamer of a dragonfly's wings.

"Martin!" he shouts. "Martin?"

Then he looks up.

The sky is a riot of colors and flesh and long, creeping fingers and the dark of the deep crushing sea and scorching fire. Horror creeps up his spine from somewhere deep in his stomach—what has he done?

Wait, why did he think that?

Jon staggers back towards the house, the myriad of wings fluttering in an attempt to keep him from falling over, and the motion of their tendons and muscles mixing with his own is sickening and so viscerally _wrong_. "Martin!" he yells into the house. Without wanting to, he Knows the entire building is empty.

His feet crunch on papers, strewn over the entrance. He scoops them up—a statement, the one he'd been reading.

This is not a statement.

Jon scans the papers, looks up at the sky, and lets them fall from his hands. He ended the world, is what he did.

But where the fuck is Martin? He was in town, wasn't he? That's what he'd said. Maybe he's still there. Jon Knows it isn't true like he knows the world is twisting into a new, terrible shape under the guidance of a thousand different demons.

Then the memories come rushing back, and although through the Beholding's eye they are a clinical documentary, just the facts, Jon sobs and bites the back of his hand as he remembers. Martin's gone. Whole body shaking, Jon slides unwillingly to the floor. He rakes one hand through his hair, and his fingers brush something cold, freezing cold, actually, above his head.

He's had enough shocks for today.

But then he runs his shaking fingers over some kind of ring that's so cold he can barely touch it that floats above him.

Jon gets up and drags himself into the bathroom.

The shape that greets him is not his own. It has a dozen mismatched wings that seem to move of their own accord, strange seams that trace over its skin, and a shining silver halo, like a deeply disturbing angel. The shape's hand moves to touch its cheek. Its fingers graze over one of the seams, and the seam opens to reveal a single shining eye in piercing blue.

Jon shouts, seeing his own hand through the eye on his cheek, not his eyes, where is Martin, what's happening, why, how can it stop, it has to _STOP_ —

A different shape appears in the mirror behind him.

Jon skitters backwards, flailing around and knocking things over with his goddamn wing bouquet, but there's nothing behind him. He looks back into the mirror and sees the same amorphous smudge hovering behind his shoulder. The longer he looks, the more detail he thinks he can discern; pale white hair, soft hands, freckles, an oversized jumper.

"Martin?" he breathes. He reaches out to the shape on the mirror, and another eye opens on his palm, and he can see too much, it's too much, light and reflecting and perspective and _this sight is not my own_.

The Martin-echo puts his hand up to his side of the mirror and presses his palm to Jon's, and the extra eyes close.

"Martin," Jon breathes. It's really him. Something inside Jon cracks, and he feels tears start to pour down his face. The other eyes squeeze shut as the tears brush their lashes.

He tries to follow Martin into the mirror the way he'd done before; as simple as stepping sideways. But he can’t. "Martin?" He feels for the loneliness around him, but there isn't anything there; it's all lost in the tangle of other fears.

There is no Lonely. After the ritual, the otherspace of the Forsaken has been drawn into the world. Instead of an overlay just a step away, it's a real place. It has to be, otherwise—

If he thinks about it too much, he'll convince himself that all of this isn’t happening.

"I'm coming to get you, Martin, wherever you are. I promise. I love you."

From somewhere else, Martin is smiling at him, and Jon knows what he has to do.

He has to be enough.


	2. Two Eyepatches at Once

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for discussion of death. 
> 
> Aaaand SMASH CUT TO MY GIRLS GEORGIE AND MELANIE

"Georgie, stop!" Jon protests. "Don't do that!"

"You're an angel!" Georgie giggles and tries to grab the halo again, like a cat intent on capturing the red dot of a laser pointer. 

Jon ducks out of the way and darts into her house without so much as a by-your-leave. "Melanie, make her stop!"

"Jon, you child," Melanie scolds instead of intervening. 

"Mels, he is absolutely covered in wings, like… every kind of wing you could possibly imagine. And there are these dark scars are all over his body. Some short, some long… Jon, what _are_ those?" Georgie pauses in her assault of poking to give Jon a critical once-over. Her already dark eyes seem even darker, or maybe it's just the light. "Are they _hairy_? Yikes, now I really hope those aren't scars. And where's that guy in the knitted jumpers you're always talking about, Martin? I thought the two of you were closer than two halves of an oyster."

"Martin?" All of Jon's eyes start to water, the tears soaking through his clothes and in general being absolutely disgusting. "Well he's not—I couldn't—I—I'm going to get him, Georgie, that's why I'm here." His clothes get uncomfortably damp as he blinks away the tears, and he dabs at some of them with his sleeve rather uselessly. 

"Holy fuck!" Georgie gasps. "Those slashes are eyes. Cool." She gives one of them a swift poke, and Jon jerks backwards, closing the extra eyes to protect them. 

" _Georgie, don't be mean!_ " He tugs his jacket tighter around him. "That really hurt."

She gives him a hollow grin. "I mean, you did just show up at my door like you're looking for bible angel auditions or something. I feel like I have a right to poke."

"Let him sit down," Melanie sighs. 

"Okay, you heard her. Let's see if we can find your boyfriend." Georgie waves Jon towards the sofa. "How did you even find _us_?"

Jon wordlessly spreads out his wings, all twelve of them. He has six sets, he's come to learn. Swan, dragonfly, fruit bat, io moth, owl, and, worst of all, flying fish. Those always need to be kept damp, otherwise they start to flake, and they aren't even _wings_. Some of his eyes open, along his arms and hands and face, and the halo glows a little bit brighter. "I Looked."

"Makes sense when you put it that way." Georgie grins. "I bet you got all kinds of new powers to play with." She moves to Melanie's side and idly leans against her. 

Jon huddles on the couch on the other side of Melanie, but not too close. Even when she worked at the Archives, they never really touched; at first because they were both too awkward, and then because Jon was afraid she'd use the opportunity to stab him. 

The Admiral pads up to him from somewhere underneath the coffee table. The ginger tomcat snuffles at Jon’s leg and jumps into his lap, deciding to be unperturbed by the eyes or wings. Or maybe he just likes the smell of Jon's fish fins. He paws at a fin—the broken one—curiously, which happens to be the one Jon broke a week ago, and Jon hisses. 

The Admiral hisses back. 

Melanie watches them judgmentally and then asks, "So… why did you need to find us? Can't you just find Martin, wherever he went?" 

Jon gently scratches the Admiral behind his ears, and the cat purrs contentedly. "He disappeared into the Lonely, but the Lonely has been made a part of physical reality after… the apocalypse. I think he's trapped somewhere in the world which has become a kind of homeland, I suppose, for all of the Forsaken. A direct manifestation of the Lonely. Much in the same way that the Spiral's dimensions have been made manifest in the Northwest Passage between the Pacific and the Atlantic."

"Huh." Melanie nibbles on a fingernail thoughtfully. 

He continues with his briefing. "I believe he's in Nulogorsk, a fishing village in Russia. All records of it vanished in 1983. The town itself was never contacted again, and satellites have been unable to locate it in the years since.. But I was able to Look, and I can see Nulogorsk has returned. Not very well, though." He leaves out the reason why–the gaze of Something Else on him, loving and magnetic.

Georgie plays with a piece of Melanie's dark hair. "How the ever loving fuck are you getting to this place? Wait, where is it? Near Archangel, I should hope."

"It's actually on the Sea of Japan. So the other side of the Eurasian continent." Jon shrugs. "I thought I might fly… maybe walk a bit…" It sounds insane out loud. 

The Admiral meows his agreement, and Jon understands his meow as " _Of course you are insane_." This does nothing for Jon’s mental health. 

Georgie shakes her head, making her curly ringlets bounce, and lets go of Melanie's hair. "Not to be dramatic or anything, but death is probably better. That will take you literal years, even if you do nothing but walk every day without sleeping or eating or showering or anything. What if you drive?" 

"Weeks or months, probably. But I don't think many gas stations are working anymore, even if I did manage to steal someone's car. It took me two weeks to get down to London, and I already know the way." He doesn’t mention that he flew into a power line and got tangled in it, injuring one of his many wings. 

"That is the dumbest fucking thing I ever heard someone say," Melanie declares. "And I heard Georgie say that her favorite color was cookies." 

"NO!" Georgie yells in protest. "I said it was cookies that are brown on the bottom, because that means they're crispy and—why am I explaining myself? You know what I meant!"

"This is the only way I can get him back!" Jon adds defensively, deciding to leave the matter of the cookies for now.

Melanie shakes her head at both of them. "How do you even know he's in fucking Numble… Noodle…"

"Nulogorsk."

"How do you even know he's there?" Georgie demands. "You said you couldn't see him, even if you could see this magical disappearing town."

Jon scowls. "I just Know."

"Convenient. So why did you come here? I'd expect you to be halfway across the English Channel by now with some half-brewed plan and a tin of biscuits and loose tea, sailing your merry way to the sweet oblivion of death." Georgie tilts her head to the side, and that's when Jon notices that her eyes aren't darker—they're pure black. 

"I just wanted to make sure the two of you were alright before I left. I mean, in all likelihood, it'll be a solid four years before you see me again, if ever," he lies. Lying hurts now, like cold lemon juice on his teeth, but he does it anyway. 

The Admiral snuffles at Jon's lie, tail tip twitching. 

"Uh-huh. Well, have fun traversing the new hellscape of our reality. I’m staying here. I’d rather die at home than in the wilderness of Russia, freezing my stupid ass off." Georgie gives Jon a beaming smile. 

"I’ll go." 

"What?" Jon and Georgie demand in unison. Even the Admiral looks surprised. 

Melanie huffs, practically insulted. "I said I’ll go with you."

Jon breathlessly stutters, "You don’t have to—I don’t want you to think—it’s fine, I can—" 

"Stop sputtering. Georgie, you’re coming too." 

"What?!" Georgie squawks. 

"Listen, there’s literally nothing here for anyone. The world is fucked. I figure staying with this idiot, we might actually find out the source of the problem."

"No! No, I can fly, and you two can’t. It’s how I got here. I might have wished you would come with me, but logistically, it's much better for me to go by myself." 

"And how are you going to fly when one of your wings is busted?" Melanie asks sharply. 

Jon shuffles his functional wings. "How did you know that?" 

"I can hear the good dragonfly wing buzzing, and the sound is louder on the far side. Anyway, you haven’t answered my question." 

"I… I was going to cycle." 

Georgie bursts out laughing. "An angel," she practically howls, "on a _bicycle_. Looking for his vanished boyfriend in a Russian fishing village. Fuck, this world has gone sideways!" 

Jon squishes away from her, deeper into the couch. 

"Georgie, stop it," Melanie snaps. "I know you don't mean—"

"And I'm going with you, apparently! It's too bad that reality TV isn't a thing anymore, because we have the makings of a fucking incredible sitcom right here." Georgie giggles again, and Jon can't stop staring at her pure black eyes. Even the whites are gone now, like her pupils have been blown impossibly wide. "Why won't you all just lay down and die?" she asks with the breathless incredulity of someone arguing with insanity. "Why?"

"Stop!" Melanie shouts, slamming her fist down on what she thinks is the sofa's armrest, but is actually Georgie's leg. "Oh, fuck, I’m sorry, George—" 

But Georgie only laughs. "Why can't you see how funny it all is? You're all so _pointless_!"

It's only now that Jon understands what is happening. He lets his extra eyes open, and he can see the pure white energy of the End spiraling around Georgie. Around his own hands, purple sparks of Beholding swirl through the fading pearl blue echoes of Martin's Loneliness, and Melanie has just a smattering of faded reddish Slaughter energy clinging to her legs and splattered over her eyes like a mask. 

"See something you like, Archivist?" Georgie's face is hidden behind a swirling fog of white and grey smoke, like a mask. "With all those big eyes of yours?"

Jon wonders how many people across the world only encountered the powers in passing, like her, and how many of them are now on their way to becoming avatars themselves. 

Melanie shakes her head ever so slightly to prevent Jon from commenting. "Have you talked to Basira yet?"

"No. She's—" Jon thinks of her and gets a flash of wild freedom, paws on the ground, movement and momentum. "Whatever part of the Hunt came through, it managed to find her. She's with Daisy. I don't think she wants to come back." 

"Oh." Melanie chews on her lip. 

"And like a comedian who knows that real comedy is repetition, you come crawling back to me for a third time to ask me to do something I really would rather not. Aren't you tired of it? I don't even _like_ you."

"I just came to make sure you were okay," Jon repeats, although Georgie's words sting a bit. "I think the two of you should stay here."

"But Jon—Georgie, go make us some tea." Melanie looks directly at Jon. Her eyes are hidden behind a strip of black fabric patterned with little spaceships and lightsabers, rather than sunglasses. Or two eyepatches at once. Jon accidentally Beholds her and Georgie in the weeks before the Watcher's Crown, giggling and making off-color pirate jokes, and feels like he's intruding on something private. 

Georgie grudgingly pads into the kitchen, muttering under her breath, and the pure white miasma of the End trails behind her like thin silk scarves. 

"Jon," Melanie interrupts. 

"Um. Yes?"

"I know you really wanted to ask us to go with you. And… I actually think it might be a good idea. We've been mostly protected because of Georgie's connection to the End, but it’s starting to corrupt her into something else, you’ve heard what she sounds like now. I was hoping you might be able to help her." 

"I really don’t think I—" 

She shakes her head. "Jon, you’re probably one of the only people on Earth who could. The way things are now, I think she’ll end up joining the End permanently, and I am not about to let that happen." 

Her words just make Jon sadder. "I’m sorry this happened to you. Both of you wanted to get away from all of this, but I just brought it into your home again—" 

"It’s not your fault—" 

He wrings his hands anxiously. "But it is! It is _painfully literally_ all my fault. I read the statement of the Watcher’s Crown, I made all of this happen, and then Martin tried to save me, but he vanished into the Lonely. I didn’t ask him to do that! I would never have asked him to do that. What if I never get him back? I don’t—I think he’s still alive? I want him to still be alive. But I don’t Know, and it’s driving me _mad_. I can’t save you or Georgie because I did this to _everyone_." 

Melanie absorbs that for a moment. "You wrecked the planet? Personally?" 

"I didn’t mean to. Elias made me read the summoning. Then I woke up facedown on a gravel path, and everything was wrong." Jon slides to the floor and puts his face in his hands. "I’m so sorry, Melanie. I shouldn't do anything, I always make it worse." 

She reaches out to pat him on the arm and only gets empty air. "Well, there's good news. You can start fixing this mess that is most certainly _Elias_ ' fault by preventing Georgie from becoming a complete avatar, and finding out what happened to Martin, and kicking Elias' ass for destroying the world. And we're going to help you. I still wanted to knife Elias, like, a lot, especially now. It’s not even a slaughter thing, I just genuinely want him to die. Also, I forgot to ask this before, are you on the floor?" 

Jon sniffles, all of his eyes watering, crouched on the floor like a little hobgoblin. "No." 

She shakes her head. "Get up, please, I don’t want to trip over you. Break another one of your wings, that's just what we need."

He scrambles to his feet. 

"Now c’mere. Don’t say anything about this to anyone." 

They share the world’s most awkward hug. Melanie is skinnier than even Jon, and they’re all elbows and knees. 

She holds him at arm's length. "Will you at least try to help Georgie? And me? And everyone? It's a lot, but… the only other option is just sobbing on the floor until the rest of the world collapses in on itself." 

"When you put it like that," Jon mumbles, face pressed into Melanie’s shoulder at an uncomfortable angle that muffles his voice. "How can I refuse?" 


End file.
